I am frequently troubleshooting problems in a Windows Command Prompt.  There are some functions which can be tested at a very basic level.  For example, if I am unable to connect to a server via Windows Explorer, I might jump into a command prompt and try to ping the server. 

ping [servername]

The screen turns black, a popup appears and in the center of the screen you see: 

"You may be a victim of software counterfeiting."

Down in the bottom right hand corner, you see:

"This copy of Windows is not genuine."

In a previous post, I explained how to disable the Windows 7 firewall and leave it to Microsoft to change how an operation is performed.

Like the previous post, there are times when I don't want the firewall in the way of troubleshooting a problem.  The following is how to disable it.

From a Command Prompt run as the administrator, enter the following: